If Only Rickey, Lesher, McCarty & Carreon Had Made The Same Team!
Posted by Steve Lombardi on March 18, 2008
Here's a fun fact: Using Play Index, and setting it for "For single seasons, From 1901 to 2007, Bats RH, Throws LH, Played 50% of games at C, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, LF, CF, RF, DH, or OF, (requiring PA>=1), sorted by greatest number of players matching criteria " shows us that there's never been a big league team with three position players who Bat/Right and Throw/Left on their roster getting a PA in a the same season. Here's the teams with two guys like this in a season:
Year Lg Team Number Players Matching +----+--+---------------------------------+------+-----------------------------------------+ 2000 AL Seattle Mariners 2 Rickey Henderson / Brian Lesher 1998 AL Oakland Athletics 2 Rickey Henderson / Brian Lesher 1996 NL San Francisco Giants 2 David McCarty / Mark Carreon 1995 NL San Francisco Giants 2 Mark Carreon / David McCarty 1983 AL Oakland Athletics 2 Rickey Henderson / Kelvin Moore 1982 AL Oakland Athletics 2 Rickey Henderson / Kelvin Moore 1981 AL Oakland Athletics 2 Rickey Henderson / Kelvin Moore 1962 NL Houston Colt .45's 2 Carl Warwick / Bobby Shantz 1911 AL St. Louis Browns 2 Paul Meloan / Jim Murray
March 18th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Rube Bressler's career overlapped those of Hal Chase and Johnny Cooney. All three were long-career bats right, throws left position players, but I guess no two were ever teammates. Bressler & Cooney were also pitchers for some seasons.
Switch-hitters who throw lefty are also rare - maybe you could repeat your search for them?
March 18th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Wow...this is the exact same subject as one of my upcoming TK notes...Kurkjian talked alot about this phenomenon in his book.
March 19th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Gerry - see this link:
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/ten-things-i-didnt-know-last-week24/
there's something in there about BB/TL guys.
March 23rd, 2008 at 4:45 pm
I bat right and throw left